Ngenisiwe Ntombela is a Social Work Educator at North West University, and practised as a social worker for many years before joining academia. She has supervised a number of postgraduate students and conducted article-writing workshops. She holds a certificate at Master’s level in Community Service Learning awarded by Free State University in 2009. She has worked with local communities, assisting them to manage their projects and to register these as non-profit organisations through the Department of Social Development. Ngenisiwe has worked with faith-based organisations in a multidisciplinary team, initiating community development, such as welfare, health and education programmes. She was an executive member of the South African Higher Education Community Engagement Forum from 2013-2016, and co-founded the PIN project for people in need. The project also caters for AIDS orphans and involves grandparents in community development projects, such as making beadwork in the Richards Bay area in KwaZulu-Natal and selling it in UK, Spain and Italy.
Ngenisiwe was secretary of the Association of Schools of Social Work Education in South Africa from 2009-2011, and has worked as a probation officer, compiling pre-sentencing reports for juveniles who have violated the law.